Well what a dire Christmas break we're having weather wise ! Things started off looking good at the start of the holidays and I had planned a specimen Roach campaign over the festive period, but it's all gone a bit wrong !
The lake I was going to target has suffered badly from flooding, and whilst the water level itself isn't so much of a problem, it's the colour of the water that is. The lake has turned a very muddy brown compared to it's usual clarity at this time of year and realistically this will ruin the Roach fishing. So I have been scratching around a bit trying to find something to do and have ended up reverting back to a bit of Carp fishing on a more heavily stocked 'hungry' club water on which I had a very good session using a new method to me, zig fishing. I had always planned on getting to grips with this method of fishing with this time of year in mind as the Carp can usually be sat off the bottom for long periods of time in the slightly relatively warmer layers of water that can form, known as thermoclines. Being a reasonably deep and featureless water that I was fishing I decided to give it a go. The day was bright, and a rare break in the stormy weather of late. I had to search around a bit in order to locate some fish but once I got the first bite, sport was quite hectic, especially for the time of year. I fished two different colours of foam on the hook and though I did catch on both colours, one stood out head and shoulders above the other. The baits were fished at about half depth and within the same area as each other so the comparison was quite a fair one. Though the fish in this lake would be classed as 'hungry' they are no push over and the zigs certainly caught them off guard, and interestingly to prove this a fair proportion of the fish were in double figures which is not something that happens when bottom fishing here. Usually in a multiple catch you may get an odd better fish, but normally the only other way to get through to them is with pre baiting. Zigs are certainly something I will be playing around with on other waters in the future, especially when the bottom bait fishing is slow.

I started off well with a number of Roach of this stamp during my first couple of sessions, then the lake flooded !

 

 



Zig caught 16lb'er part of a catch of a dozen fish on the method, not too shabby for 29th December !

 

 



To conclude this entry, This morning I decided to try another club water that may hold some better Roach, in an effort to continue my campaign for the species, but unusually for me I packed up after only a couple of hours having not had a single bite...the water is shallow and a lot of cold water has gone in lately and this can be the only reason why the fish were showing no interest whatsoever. Again this is what you would class as a 'hungry water' and does have a large head of silver fish, so to not even get a liner within a couple of hours is quite staggering...
Hopefully the Roach fishing will pick up again if this foul weather ever abates, and I will be able to get back to chasing specimens of these lovely silver fish, until then I guess I will be scratching around doing whatever suits the conditions. Hope to report back soon !

Good start to the New Year !

Happy New Year all, and here's to a great year of fishing!

My year has got off to a good start, a couple of days on a new Roach water saw me bank another fish over the pound barrier of 1lb 3oz. It's another water stuffed full of Roach, but the Carp anglers on there assure me that it does contain some very good fish, almost certainly over 2lb...
The fish I had was landed on feeder and mini boilie, this may well be the way forward on this water instead of pole tactics, as the hordes of tiny 'eyes and tails' make it very hard work indeed, as I found out yesterday, and as it's a little way from my home I cannot introduce bait regularly enough to feed them off nor guarantee to get the swim I want as I could with the other water which is just a few hundred yards from where I live.
The water also contains specimen Perch along with the other lakes on the complex, and it is these that have captured my interest along with the Roach, so I have been 'mixing it up' a bit in the last few sessions with some good results. Last week My son and I had upwards of twenty Perch in two days, from other lakes on the complex, with me taking 8 or 9 over two pounds, to 2lb 10oz, none of the others were less than a pound and a half...and yesterday I had fish of exactly 3lb's and 2lb 14oz from the 'new' water. This brings my total of 3lb plus Perch to 4 now, so I'm definitely looking towards a 4lb'er as my next target.

1lb 3oz Roach

3lb Perch

Operation 'Roach'..phase one complete!

Yesterday all the hard work I have been putting in lately paid off. A session using feeder tactics saw me land a beautiful Roach of 1lb 4oz. Now in a water that seems to contain a gazillion Roach, many of them less than 8oz, that is quite an achievement. Over the last few weeks I have been wading through the hordes of small fish, applying a little prebait in between sessions, and the average size of fish I have been catching has slowly been creeping up. So far I have relied on the Pole, but yesterday the wind was just not conducive to this tactic, so with a little thought I came up with a plan that would hopefully work as well as the Pole has been. Fishing the same swim I have been focusing on, but from the opposite bank, ( the lake is fairly narrow here ), I used a small spod to apply a measured amount of Hemp to the area, and cast small maggot feeders over the top. I utilised a two rod approach and used 'speci' tactics using bite alarms and bobbins for bite indication. The day went well, with a reasonable stamp of fish falling to the tactic, and with one fish nudging the magical mark at 15oz I felt I was getting close. Mid afternoon, I hooked a fish that felt quite good, at first I thought I may have hooked a skimmer bream as the odd one had put in an appearance amongst the Roach, then I thought possibly a Perch as there was the odd jag and it seemed to be fighting quite hard for a bream...funny how I didn't allow myself the possibility that it might be a Roach....when it came up just below the surface, my heart skipped a beat, it was just in a another class compared to the fish I had been catching.  Safely in the net I knew I'd cracked the pound mark, the scales conforming it at 1lb 4oz, a good fish, not a 2lb'er, but a personal milestone in my quest, and a lovely fish. It showed that my persistance was working along with the approach, and that maybe, just maybe I may eventually get close to or actually achieve my goal.

For scale the reel is a '4000' size.

Roach sessions..

The quest continues for big Roach, 'big' being a pound or over as a realistic target. Persistance and adjustments in bait, feed and methods has seen the stamp of fish in the stillwater I am targeting go up recently, also a drop in temperature has probably helped in keeping the smaller fish at bay.
A couple of good sessions recently have boosted my enthusiasm to keep at it, some bonus Perch over a pound really stretched the elastic in my pole the other day and were great fun on such light tackle, and a couple of Roach of 10oz or so convinced me yesterday that I am on the right track and hopefully not too far away from achieving my goal. Today I was even more justified to be so confident as the stamp of fish was even better and I managed to creep close to the mark with a nice 14oz fish, that magical pound barrier is within sight, but once I achieve that, my task becomes even harder. I feel sure the water i'm fishing contains fish in the upper pound bracket and just might hold a two pounder, I know this because I have had them to 1lb 13oz from here before, plus I have caught some big Roach while fishing for Tench and Carp using meat for bait during the warmer weather, but of course the feeling of acievement wasn't there due to using tackle far too strong, and I like to catch particular species on my own terms using appropriate tackle and bait.
Appropriate tackle and bait in this instance is an 8 metre Whip, pole float, 3llb line and 2.5lb hooklink. Bait is hemp, maggot, corn and tares. You really do get the best from this species (Roach), by using a pole or Whip, I'm using a 1-5 elastic which to me seems just right and you get a great fight from even 4oz fish! anything over half a pound really gives a good account of itself, and they can really be appreciated on this tackle, so catching one of a pound or more will be a proper buzz! The Perch have already tested the gear to the max so i know what to expect from a decent Roach.
Looking forward to the next few sessions!

That's not a Roach!

Once again this week I have been focusing on the Roach in my local stillwater, the aim being to try and catch as many fish over a pound as I can and hopefully get somewhere near the two pound barrier....

I have been using tactics that I hoped would produce the goods for me, avoiding maggots I have stuck with larger hookbaits in the form of Corn and Tares, and using hemp as the feed, the idea being to fill up the smaller fish quickly with the seed and draw in the bigger fish. For precise presentation I have favoured the Pole, cupping in the feed accurately. So far although the stamp of fish I have been getting is certainly better than I would get on maggot, it is still falling woefully short of my target. Why this is I am not quite sure, maybe the water temperature is still a bit too warm to put the smaller fish out of the equasion, maybe I am fishing the wrong swims, or perhaps I have got my whole approach wrong...
Admittedly in the past all my bigger Roach have been caught in much colder temperatures and also on maggot although I have had to suffer many small fish as well alongside. We have experienced some very prolonged warm weather here the last few weeks, and only now has the wind switched to the North and temperatures are beginning to barely break double figures, ( we are yet to have a frost ), it will take the water a week or two to follow suit I would imagine, so maybe then things will change and I will start to get the results.

In the meantime I was reminded how you can land big fish on light, balanced tackle at the weekend, something I have been an advocate of for a while now. Although I am tartgeting Roach I am not using what would be termed 'ultra fine' tackle, sticking with 3.4lb line and a hollow elastic rated 5-8. Most matchmen would use hooklinks down to 1lb and elastics in the 1-3 range, but I am hoping for big Roach and I know that I will inevitably hook other species that are much larger such as Bream, Tench, and Carp, so I am erring on the side of caution and hoping I have the balance between enough finesse in the tackle and still retain the strength to deal with larger rogue specimens. This is exactly what happened in the last couple of sessions, one was a Carp of 9lb 12oz, and another one at around 8lb along with a Tench of 3lb plus. The Carp tested my tackle to the limits, but patience and not panicking ( just!), won through and I was able to play and land these fish on the light tackle despite there being snags nearby. I was very pleased actually, and It doesn't mean I am over gunned for the Roach, I still get a decent fight from fish of 1/2lb up, ok it's not the same tackle testing fight as Carp or Tench and you wouldn't expect it to be, unless the fish I was targeting ran to 3 or 4lb...I wish!

Thats not a Roach!

I'll keep plodding on for now as the Saltwater fishing opportunities are becoming fewer and far between now that the weather is closing in, and freshwater fishing is coming more to the fore for myself and my friends, hopefully there will be a river trip or two before christmas in search of Chub and Roach, and maybe as the temperatures drop the bigger Roach in my stillwater will begin to show.

Thats more like it, but still nowhere near the size I'm aiming for..

Roach revival

I fancied a change from the saltwater this weekend and so I made plans to fish for possibly my favourite coarse fish, Roach.

I have promised myself to try hard for a big one this year, by big I mean a pound or over as a realistic target, Hemp was bought and prepared and Tares and Corn would be the hook bait. Now I would normally use maggot as the hookbait but of course they are indiscriminate as to the size of fish they will catch, so rather than sit through the hordes of tiny 'blades' I am prepared to get less bites but hopefully pick up a better stamp of fish overall. Being a bit rusty my first session on the Pole went fairly well, and using the Corn and Tares for hookbaits definitely eliminated the 'eyes and tails', and for the most part all the fish were of a slightly better size. I have a few little tactical things to iron out regarding the use of the bigger hookbaits as I seemed to be bumping a good few fish and with some obviously better ones in amongst them it became a little frustrating, i'll have to experiment with the hooking arrangement and try to get some softer Tares but I am on the right track without doubt. Once again my eldest son accompanied me this weekend and he had a nice day catching silvers alongside me in the next swim.

Does any other fish epitomise Autumn more the the Roach?...

Different strokes

My summer and winter fishing could not be two more different things. Fishing in the Salt during the summer can be hard work compared to the much tamer nature of Coarse fishing. Saltwater lure fishing is at times physically demanding, often there is a long hike or, a long steady paddle in the Kayak to reach our mark. Once we reach our spot quite frequently from the shore we will be wading which can involve several hours of holding yourself steady against tide, current, swell or all of these. The same can be said when fishing from the Kayak. Lure fishing is also an aspect of our sport where you are constantly casting and retrieving, using all of your concentration in trying to work the lure in the right way and attempting to find out what it is the fish want on any given day or night. My friends and I often joke about us having a 'winter' weight and a 'summer' one, because of all the extra excersise we get whilst pursuing the Bass and other species in the warmer weather!

Winter fishing by comparison gives us a rest, I am not saying Coarse anglers in general are lazy, far from it in fact as some anglers will also walk miles along rivers or around large gravel pits, I know I've done it myself at times, but most of my local coarse fishing is quite easy as far as that goes, being generally very small and intimate venues with only short walks from the car to reach a swim, so during the winter I would say fitness levels drop, ( what little I have! ), and the fishing is generally more relaxed and less intensive, even on the odd excursion to the mainland once the hard work of getting there and setting up is done, apart from day trips on the rivers, it is time to sit back, put the kettle on and relax! Even then when on day trips to the river we will take a break and have some lunch and a cuppa to compare notes on how the day is going, all very laid back and civilised...
So why not make it easy on myself and just Coarse fish all year and leave the hard work of Saltwater fishing to those more inclined towards such things? Well the truth is Summer Coarse fishing, for me, is well....rubbish! Living where I do on an Island, the Coarse fishing is somewhat limited. There are a few small ponds and bits of very small not what you could even call a river,  along with maybe a handful of Carp syndicates, all of which I have done in previous years, and thats the problem here, I find once I have 'done it' I have to move on and find another challenge, otherwise I begin to lose interest..
I love the big open aspect of gravel pits, and the long meandering nature of the big, or even small rivers, in fact I love to have options, but we simply don't have that available here otherwise things might possibly be a bit different, and I may never have needed to bother with the Saltwater if indeed it had been readily accessible. I love the Coarse fishing, but there simply isn't enough to do here, and so we have to limit ourselves to Coarse fishing in the colder months when, sensibly, things are just not doable in the sea...
We may not be very fortunate on the freshwater front, but luckily the sea fishing can be something very special despite heavy netting and commercial fishermen hammering our waters year on year, particularly with the methods we are now using ( see other blog !), and as not fishing is simply not an option for an obsessive like me, it would be stupid not to!
However it seems now My fishing year is becoming naturally cyclic, and this has been developing over the last few years, and that is to fish the Salt when there is an abundance of opportunity in the summer and transpose to Freshwater during Autumn and Winter, when the Coarse species are in their best condition of the year, and also can be something of a challenge compared to post spawning condition and appetite. This suits me fine, variety is the spice of life, ( supposedly), after all, and so I welcome this change of the seasons, it suits me down to the ground, 6 months of full on nose to the grindstone fishing and six months of more relaxed pursuit!

So this will be my Chronicle of the Autumn and Winter Coarse fishing, for those who might be interested in that side of things, and will be kept seperate to my other fishing of the Spring and Summer, though I shall link the two just in case anyone fancies a peek at the other out of curiosity!

I will begin chronicling as soon as I engage in any meaningful angling, which may still be a little while yet, But rest assured as it happens it will appear right here.
I have already begun making plans so I have some direction ready for when the time comes, and I have set myself some targets alongside to give me focus.
On the agenda are Chub for which I shall have to 'escape from Alcatraz' and hopefully venture over to the Throop fishery in Dorset a few times to achieve. I'll be happy with a few other river species on those trips such as Roach and Dace etc. I have found a love of moving water since venturing over to the Itchen fishery in pursuit of Grayling on trotting gear a couple of years running and would love to practise this a little more often. There are a few possibilities locally for Roach and Perch as well, Carp will probably feature as they will be an inevitable by catch, though I am not so size obsessed as I once was with the species. There are a few other possibilities that may arise to throw in the mix so there will be plenty going on, all things being equal...

Hopefully I will be back to report soon.
Thanks for reading.